Gender disparities in the burden of non-communicable diseases in India: Evidence from the cross-sectional study

Introduction: The present study aims to determine the socio-economic inequalities in the self-reported NonCommunicable Diseases (NCDs) considering the gender perspective in India. Methods: The study utilizes a cross-sectional study data from India, based on the public repository of Demographic and Health Surveys, 2015-16. The survey utilized multi-stage sampling procedure. The total of 699,686 women and 103,525 men age 15-49 years were analyzed in the study. Descriptive statistics and binary logistic regression has been used to understand the interplay between socio-cultural factors associated with at least one self-reported non-communicable disease in India. Additionally, poor-rich-ratio and concentration Index has been utilized for analyzing the socio-economic inequalities in the burden of non-communicable diseases in the country. Results: The findings from the study suggest that, the overall prevalence of reporting at least one non-communicable disease was found to be higher amongst the women as compared to men. The results shows that the odds of reporting NCDs was higher among individuals (both men and women), who belong to the age bracket of 35 years and above, and are widowed/divorced/separated, residing in urban areas, belonging to affluent class, living in the Southern part of the country, consuming alcohol, smoking, and chewing tobacco. Conclusions: The evidence generated by the study helps us to comprehend the socio-economic, demographic and behavioral predictors associated with the prevalence of self-reported non-communicable diseases in India, with an inclination towards the respondents belonging to the richest wealth quintile.